By Sarah Mehta, Fellow, Immigrants' Rights Project, ACLU & Alex Berger, Legislative Assistant, ACLU at 9:36am
In yesterday's flurry of activity in the Senate Judiciary Committee on the comprehensive immigration reform bill, there were two big wins for civil liberties: Blumenthal 2, an amendment that limits solitary confinement in immigration detention, and Blumenthal 8, an amendment that restricts Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers from conducting raids in schools, churches or hospitals.
Today Maryland and Oregon are celebrating the signing of new laws expanding access to driver's licenses to all residents, including undocumented immigrants. We are part of a movement. Our hope is that our success inspires the passage of bills in more than a dozen other states considering similar measures.
In most states today, it is difficult, if not impossible, for people to go about their daily lives without the ability to drive. Simple but essential tasks such as driving kids to school or to extracurricular activities, picking up groceries, going to the doctor, and traveling to workbecome riddled with hardship. As a result, people without access to driver's licenses are faced with the difficult "choice" of either not meeting their basic needs or driving and risking arrest and other negative repercussions.
By Esha Bhandari, Equal Justice Works Fellow, ACLU at 11:48am
This week's New Yorker features the harrowing ordeal of Mark Lyttle, a U.S. citizen with mental disabilities who was deported to Mexico. Lyttle was born in North Carolina and has psychiatric and cognitive disabilities. He was inexplicably referred to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in 2008 after being misidentified as an undocumented immigrant from Mexico even though he had never been to Mexico, shared no Mexican heritage, and did not speak any Spanish. As the New Yorker article notes, "Lyttle is brown-skinned," and "the vagaries of race and ethnicity obviously played a part" in causing him to be singled out for immigration enforcement.
By Laura W. Murphy, Director, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 10:19am
For over 90 years the ACLU has defended the rights of everyone in the United States, whether born in this country or abroad, because the Constitution protects the civil liberties and civil rights of all of them.
The data from a new poll released yesterday that was commissioned by CAMBIO, a new coalition for immigration reform, confirms what we have long known – that the American people agree wholeheartedly that all people in the United States, including immigrants, have fundamental rights under our Constitution.
By Michael Tan, Staff Attorney, Immigrants' Rights Project, ACLU at 4:51pm
Today the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a landmark ruling that curtails one of the most wasteful and draconian features of our immigration lock-up system: the government's practice of putting immigration detainees behind bars for months or even years, without ever holding a bond hearing to determine if they should be locked up in the first place. In Rodriguez v. Robbins, a class-action lawsuit brought by the ACLU, the Court upheld an order requiring bond hearings for detainees locked up six months or longer while they fight their deportation cases. The ruling stands to benefit thousands of immigration detainees across the Ninth Circuit, where an estimated 25% of immigrant detainees are held every year.
Most reports on immigration focus on Latino workers and the southwest border. However, there are many faces and backgrounds of American immigrants, and the breadth of obstacles created as a result of our broken system are far-reaching. This week the Congressional Black Caucus ("CBC") and Howard University hosted a compelling discussion on immigration that highlighted the reasons why immigration is important to all communities, and is particularly relevant to Black Americans and all communities of the African diaspora.
The ACLU welcomed the bill summary released late last night by a bipartisan group of key senators – ‘the Gang of 8', and we eagerly await the introduction of complete bill text, expected later today.
For over 90 years the ACLU has defended the rights of all Americans, whether born in this country or somewhere else, because the Constitution protects the civil liberties and civil rights of all people. We will continue to serve in this critical role as the debate over the immigration reform bill begins. Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU, said:
Immigration reform must not be contingent on the false premise that an airtight 2,000-mile border is required. Instead, Congress should turn to ameliorating the tragedy of family separation along the southern border.
Thousands of families from San Diego to Brownsville have suffered the loss of people they love to deportation. Many of these families are comprised of members who are U.S. citizens, lawful residents and people who've lived here for years and tried unsuccessfully--sometimes for decades--to become residents or U.S. citizens.
By Michael Tan, Staff Attorney, Immigrants' Rights Project, ACLU at 1:22pm
This week, Wyoming confirmed that it will now provide driver’s licenses to young immigrants who came to the country as children, popularly known as “DREAMers.” The decision is the latest victory for immigrant youth granted permission to live and work in the country under the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (“DACA”) program.
Wyoming thus joins the chorus of states that have decided to let the DREAMers drive. Generally, states limit driver’s licenses to immigrants who can show they are “authorized" or “legally present” in the United States. Consistent with guidance from the federal government, the overwhelming majority of states have rightly acknowledged that immigrants granted DACA are legally authorized to be in the country, and thus eligible to drive.
An international human rights body is set to question the United States on its obligations under a key human rights treaty. The U.N. Human Rights Committee, an independent body of experts tasked with monitoring compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), this week released its list of issues, which will serve as the basis for its upcoming review of U.S. compliance with the treaty. The U.S. ratified the ICCPR in 1992 and is obligated to submit to periodic reviews of its treaty implementation efforts.
